As an example of storage apparatus of the above type, there is known a storage apparatus including two storage shelves disposed with a front-rear distance therebetween, each storage shelf comprised of a plurality vertically stacked horizontal arrays formed by disposing storage sections for storing e.g. containers side by side in the horizontal direction. A moving body is provided for conveying an article over the distance between the pair of storage shelves.
This type of storage apparatus may be formed compact as a whole, while allowing automatic carriage of an article introduced to an article carrying in and out section into a designated one of the plurality of storage sections and conversely carrying out the article from the storage section to the article carrying in and out section.
A storage apparatus of this type is disclosed in e.g. Japanese laid-open patent gazette Hei. 4-341404. In the case of the storage apparatus disclosed in this gazette, at the front face of the storage shelf, posts are arranged with a same inter-distance as the width of the storage section. Because of the presence of the posts, working spaces at the respective working sections in the article carrying in and out section are partitioned from each other. That is to say, the width of each working section was limited to be same as the width of the storage section.
Accordingly, when a worker takes out an article introduced into a certain working section of the article carrying in and out section from the storage section or when the worker places an article to be carried in into a certain working section of the article carrying in and out section, the space reserved for the work is limited, thus making the work difficult. Further, with this type of storage apparatus, in general, different kinds of articles are stored in different storage sections. Thus, when two kinds of articles are needed at one time for example, it sometimes happens that one kind of article is conveyed to one working section by the moving body and another kind of article is conveyed to another working section. And, when the two kinds of articles located at the different working sections are to be carried out, the operation is very inefficient if the working sections are partitioned from each other.
Then, as a construction for overcoming the above-described inconvenience, it is conceivable to cause a working table (a drive conveyer 9 in the case of the above gazette) of the working section to protrude to the outside of the apparatus, in order to secure a space for working. However, this results in enlargement of the front-rear width of the apparatus thus enlarging the entire apparatus disadvantageously.